Barefoot in the City of Broken Dreams (Russel Middlebrook: The Futon Years #2) by Brent Hartinger

ARC honest review for BK Books via Netgalley.

“There was no way moving to Los Angeles was going to make me give up my soul. After all, I’d already seen all the movies about Hollywood. I knew how things worked.”
Twenty-four year-old Russel Middebrook and his boyfriend have moved to Los Angeles so Russel can try to make it as a screenwriter.
Almost right away, in a forgotten old house off of Sunset Boulevard, Russel meets Isaac Brander, a once-famous film producer who is convinced he can turn Russel’s screenplay into a movie.
Russel knows that success can’t possibly come this easy. After all, most of Russel’s Los Angeles friends are so desperate to make it that it’s downright scary. His ex-boyfriend, Otto, is trying everything to become an actor, and Daniel, the sexy neighbor, doesn’t even need a casting couch to get naked.
So what’s the catch with Mr. Brander? Could it be that movies about Hollywood don’t tell the whole truth? But what does that mean for Russel’s soul?
Barefoot in the City of Broken Dreams, a companion book to Brent Hartinger’s The Thing I Didn’t Know I Didn’t Know, is a fast-paced, funny story about the price of fame in Hollywood: the hilarious lengths people will go to achieve it, and the touching secret to survival when things don’t work out exactly as planned.

*****

I believe this is part of a series of books about Russel Middlebrook, which I haven’t read any of the previous books.

Unfortunately I was bored by the end of the first chapter, then skimmed through a few more chapters…still nothing grabbed my attention. After re-reading the synopsis, it sounds like the modern gay version of Sue Townsend’s ‘Diaries of Adrian Mole’ series here in the UK from 30 years ago.

I don’t know whether it was because it was all to do with LA LA land, where there are more wannabe’s per square inch all pushing to get into the spotlight…with 90% of them ending up parking cars or waiting tables, and very few getting what they went there for. Or the fact that I found the main character very shallow and self-centred.